Harver’s Acquisition of pymetrics Will Offer ‘Wider, Deeper’ Product Line

Last week’s acquisition of pymetrics by Harver is an example of two companies with complementary technology joining forces so they can, hopefully, help employers improve the overall quality of their hiring.

Together Harver – which describes itself as a hiring solution that helps organizations improve their talent decisions – and pymetrics – which uses neuroscience as the basis for the unbiased assessment of soft skills – say they’ll address a broad set of talent acquisition and talent management needs. Their goal is to help “optimize” talent decisions throughout the employee lifecycle.

The acquisition pairs pymetrics’ behavioral-based AI methodology with Harver’s existing talent assessments. If all goes well, the result should provide customers with a wider, deeper selection of products that can address their hiring needs for both professional and hourly employees, the companies said.

Incorporating approaches from both I/O psychology and cognitive science, the companies said the combination of products will accelerate their shared vision of identifying, matching and developing the right people for the right role, and ultimately delivering better outcomes for employers with more efficiency and less bias.

“By joining forces, we will be able to offer our customers across the globe a more robust and diverse set of solutions to help them drive better talent decisions,” said Harver CEO Scott Landers. “Together, we will help enterprises maximize the potential of their employee base and empower the organizations of tomorrow.”

In a blog post, pymetrics founder and CEO Frida Polli said the companies’ missions were “incredibly aligned.” She predicted the acquisition will help pymetrics “accelerate growth and innovation, and increase scale.” She believes it will also create a more comprehensive platform for customers to take advantage of.

Objective Data

pymetrics’ assesses soft skills by using neuroscience-based tools to collect “more objective, better data about people’s soft skills by watching their behavior [rather] than by asking them questions,” Polli explained on our podcast PeopleTech.

Put another way, pymetrics’ scientific exercises are a more accurate and predictive way to gather behavioral data than relying on users’ self-reporting. “[P]eople are notoriously bad at knowing themselves and then reporting that in an accurate way,” she said.

Harver was known as Outmatch until it rebranded late last year. In May 2021 (This may get confusing), Outmatch acquired Harver, believing Harver’s platform complemented its assessment, video-interviewing and reference-checking capabilities. The combination, Outmatch said at the time, would allow employers to make more informed, more efficient hires. (The company adopted Outmatch’s name when it combined the two platforms.)

At the time of the Harver-Outmatch combination, the company said melding capabilities would create a purpose-built solution to solve volume-hiring challenges.

“Harver and pymetrics have a common goal of finding people and putting them to work, Landers told the Dutch industry website Recruitment Tech. “By joining forces, we can offer our clients around the world a more robust and diverse set of solutions to help them make better hiring decisions.”

Earlier this week, Harver said it had earned a spot (3,392) on the annual Inc. 500 listStop, which aims to identify the fastest-growing companies in America.

By Mark Feffer

Mark Feffer is executive editor of RecruitingDaily and the HCM Technology Report. He’s written for TechTarget, HR Magazine, SHRM, Dice Insights, TLNT.com and TalentCulture, as well as Dow Jones, Bloomberg and Staffing Industry Analysts. He likes schnauzers, sailing and Kentucky-distilled beverages.